Flight delay compensation: what you are actually owed

Two separate things are owed to you when a flight goes wrong, and they work differently. One depends on whose fault it was. The other does not, and it is the one more people should claim.

✓ Last checked 20 September 2026 By Oliver Jones Independent — we sell nothing

Two different entitlements

Almost all the confusion on this subject comes from treating these as one thing. They are not.

Compensation is a fixed payment for the disruption itself. It only applies if the cause was something the airline could have controlled.

Right to care is the airline’s obligation to look after you while you wait. It applies whatever the cause, including weather, air traffic control strikes and anything else the airline will tell you was not their fault. That phrase is relevant to the first entitlement and irrelevant to the second.

Passengers routinely accept “it was the weather, there is nothing we can do” and go and buy their own dinner. The weather excuses the compensation. It does not excuse the dinner.

What compensation is worth

Under the UK retained version of the EU rules, usually called UK261, amounts are fixed by distance rather than by what you paid.

Two things follow from this that surprise people.

It is unrelated to the ticket price. A £60 fare and a £400 fare on the same delayed flight attract the same compensation.

It is per passenger, not per booking. A family of four on a qualifying delay is claiming four times the figure above.

The three-hour rule is about arrival

The threshold is measured by when you arrive at your destination, not when you departed. A flight that leaves two hours late and makes some of it up in the air may not qualify. One that leaves on time and is held in the air may.

The clock stops when the aircraft doors open, which is a detail that matters in borderline cases.

Extraordinary circumstances

The exemption that airlines reach for. It genuinely covers:

• severe weather
• air traffic control restrictions and strikes
• security alerts
• strikes by people other than the airline’s own staff
• a bird strike

It genuinely does not cover:

• technical faults arising from normal operation and maintenance
• crew shortages and crew out of hours
• overbooking
• most strikes by the airline’s own staff

That last distinction is the one worth knowing. A national air traffic control strike is outside their control. Their own cabin crew walking out, in most readings, is not.

If you are told extraordinary circumstances apply, you are entitled to ask what the circumstance was. “Operational reasons” is not an answer, it is a category.

Right to care, in practice

Once a delay passes a threshold based on distance, the airline must provide:

• food and drink appropriate to the wait, usually as vouchers
• two communications such as phone calls or emails
• accommodation and transfers to it if you are stuck overnight

If they do not organise it, buy it yourself, keep every receipt, and claim it back. Be reasonable: a hotel near the airport and a normal meal are recoverable, a suite and a bottle of wine are not.

This applies even when no compensation is due. It is the entitlement most often left unclaimed.

How to claim

1. Gather it at the time. Boarding passes, booking reference, photographs of the departure board showing the delay, receipts, and the actual arrival time.
2. Claim directly with the airline. Every UK carrier has a form. It costs nothing.
3. If they refuse or go quiet, escalate to their alternative dispute resolution body, or to the Civil Aviation Authority if they do not belong to one.
4. Claims companies are a last resort. They take a substantial percentage of a payment you can usually obtain yourself with a form and some patience.

You generally have years rather than months to bring a claim, so a refusal at the airport desk is not the end of it.

Package holidays are different, and better

If the flight was part of a package, you have UK261 rights and rights against the organiser under package travel rules, which cover the holiday as a whole rather than just the flight.

That is a meaningful advantage and a reason to read how packages work and what ATOL covers before deciding that booking the parts separately is cheaper.